Holidaymakers flying to and from Stansted airport this weekend will be limited to travelling with a single small item of hand luggage if planned strikes by baggage handlers and check-in staff go ahead.

Even families will be unable to travel with a bag larger than the new hand luggage limit of 45cm wide 35cm long and 16cm deep.

The restrictions have been imposed by Swissport, the company that manages bag handling at Stansted for Ryanair, easyJet, Thomas Cook, Cyprus, Germanwings, Norwegian, Transavia and Air Malta.

In a statement issued on Tuesday evening to Times Online the company said: "If the proposed strike action goes ahead, whilst we have extensive contingency plans in place, we have advised all our customer airlines that we will do not anticipate that we will be able to handle checked-in baggage over the bank holiday weekend."

Swissport handles Ryanair, easyjet, Thomas Cook, Cyprus, German Wings, Norwegian, Transavia and Air Malta at Stansted Airport. The pay dispute does not affect any other airport at which Swissport operates.

Ryanair was first to announce the restrictions, which will be imposed on all passengers flying out of and into Stansted Airport this weekend between 5am on Saturday August 26 and 8am on Tuesday August 29.

The rule will also affect passengers who left the country with a larger piece of cabin luggage and now cannot bring it back to the UK. Their only alternative, if the strikes go ahead, would be to buy a ticket to fly into an alternative UK airport or rebook a flight with their airline which arrives at Stansted once the strikes have ended.

By contrast easyJet has today stated that passengers be able to travel with cabin luggage, even if the strikes go ahead.

Speaking to Times Online earlier today, a spokesperson for easyJet said the airline was confident that its passengers would be able to travel with both hand luggage and cabin luggage as long as it complies with the latest rules imposed by airport security, i.e. the hand luggage must conform to the afore-mentioned dimensions and not contain any liquids or cream cosmetics, meanwhile cabin luggage can weigh up to 20kg.

But the Swissport statement makes it clear that if strikes go ahead, this is not the case. It means easyJet passengers may not yet know that they will be limited to travelling with hand luggage in the event of strike action. Ryanair has written to passengers today to advise them they may be required to check-in online and travel with no checked in luggage.

Up to 500 baggage handling and check-in staff are threatening strike action in a dispute over pay. Strikes would cause widespread travel disruption on what is one of the busiest travelling weekends of the year.

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